When a patient is admitted to a medical care facility, the patient is often connected to multiple different devices used to monitor the health of the patient. For example, the patient can be connected to a Hood pressure monitor, a respiration monitor, a heart monitor, a temperature monitor, a blood-oxidation monitor, and other types of monitors. These various monitoring devices are often co-located within a bedside chassis. The bedside chassis can be large and bulky, and requires one or more leads (e.g., power leads, sensor leads, pneumatic leads, etc.) that extend from each monitoring device to the patient.
While the conventional health monitoring device may be acceptable for some applications, it can also be problematic. In particular, it is often necessary to move the patient between different locations at the medical care facility. For example, the patient may move from a triage area to an ER area, from the ER area to a radiology area, from the radiology area to a surgical area, from the surgical area to a recovery area, from the recovery area to a patient room, etc. Because of the size and/or bulkiness of the monitoring devices, the patient is generally disconnected from the devices in a first area prior to transport and reconnected to the devices in a next area after transport. This disconnecting and reconnecting can be time- and labor-intensive and also provide opportunity for error in the reconnecting. Further, the health of the patient may not be adequately monitored during the transport between areas.
An alternative solution is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 4,859,161 of Cudahy et al. that issued on Jan. 23, 1990 (“the '161 patent”). In particular, the '161 patent discloses a monitoring system including a data acquisition and processing module that receives physiological data from a patient via a plurality of wires. The module may be inserted into a bedside display unit to display the physiological data being monitored. The module may also be inserted into a portable display unit that can accompany the patient during transport. Connectors permit the module to simultaneously drive both of the display units so that no data is lost when the module is removed from the bedside unit and placed in the portable unit.
While the monitoring system of the '161 patent may reduce a need to disconnect and reconnect the various leads from and to the patient during transport between areas at the medical care facility, the system may still be less than optimal. In particular, the system still requires the same number of leads to extend from the patient to the display units, which can take a significant amount of space around the patient (and also around the bed, table, gurney, etc. at each location). In addition, the large number of leads connecting to the display unit can create opportunities for misconnection, entanglement, inadvertent snagging and disconnection, etc. Further, the module of the '161 patent may not be equipped to handle all of the monitoring needs of the patient. For example, in order to continuously monitor blood pressure, pressurized air must be supplied to a cuff on the patient. The module of the '161 patent is not capable of providing for this need.
The hospital bed and hub of the present disclosure solves one or more of the problems set forth above and/or other problems in the art.